Ransomware Attackers Demand 20 Million From U.S. Kia Motors. Strange things are afoot at Kia Motors America (KMA), a Kia Motors subsidiary with more than 800 dealerships scattered across the United States.
Recently KIA Motors has reported a nationwide IT outage impacting their mobile UVO Link apps, phone services, the company’s payment system, and several dealer-specific applications.
If you’re trying to make a payment online through KIA Motors or schedule a newly leased vehicle pickup, that might be hard to do. For the time being, you’re probably not going to be able to do that and will encounter errors when you venture onto the company’s site.
There is considerable evidence that the DopplePaymer ransomware gang has successfully attacked the company. This evidence includes a ransomware note naming Kia Motors’ parent company as the victim. The note claims that a “huge amount” of company data has been exfiltrated and demanding a $20 million payment in BitCoin to get their files unlocked and prevent the gang from releasing them to the public.
The KIA Motor ransom note contains a link to the Tor Victim page, which again mentions the parent company by name. Ransomware Attackers Demand 20 Million From U.S. Kia Motors. The curious thing about the incident so far, however, is that when KIA Motors was contacted for details about the incident, they released a somewhat terse statement.
Their statement was:
“Kia Motors America, Inc. (“Kia”) is currently experiencing an extended systems outage. Affected systems include the Kia Owners Portal, UVO Mobile Apps, and the Consumer Affairs Web portal. We apologize for any inconvenience to affected customers, and are working to resolve the issue as quickly as possible with minimal interruption to our business. We are also aware of online speculation that Kia is subject to a “ransomware” attack. At this time, we can confirm that we have no evidence that Kia or any Kia data is subject to a “ransomware” attack.”
At this point, no one can say with 100 percent certainty what’s going on, other than the fact that many of KIA Motor’s systems have been offline for days. A few have begun to come back online, but this article was written the story is continuing to develop and several of the company’s systems are still offline. If you’re a Kia Motor owner, it pays to be aware.
